Burning Skies
by Inanis Incedeco
Summary: This road has come to an end, and Merrill says goodbye to her love.


As Hawke delt out orders and formations to the ragtab band of renegade mages and her own family and friends, Merrill was fidgeting nervously. The world h ad changed forever, and the Templars were coming. Anders had gone through with his plans and destroyed the Chantry in some misguided effort to start war between the Mages and the Templars. The stupid, stupid man.

She was watching out the window in the Circle dormitory that they were sitting in. Kirkwall was burning. Templars were rampaging through the streets, murdering anyone who looked like they might somehow be a Mage in any capacity, and the Mages were turning to demons left and right, something Merrill would never have done. If they kept at it like this, every last innocent in Kirkwall would be caught in their way.

"You scared too?" Merrill jumped a little when she heard Hawke's voice, and she turned to face her wife. Hawke looked so different than usual. When she was in her Champion armour, she looked more like a great bear than her Hawke, and her face was tired, old, with eyes too sad for someone with such a big heart.

Merrill nodded. "I..." She trailed of, looking for words. "None of this seems real." She shook her head wearily. "Just this morning I woke up next to you, laughing and cuddling. Just a few hours ago we were making love in the sunshine, and now we're off to fight a war." She paused for a moment, meeting her Hawke's silent sympathetic eyes. "Does all of this feel like a dream to you too?"

A moment of silence, and then a slow reassuring smile broke out across Hawke's face. "In a moment, I'll look down, see I have no pants on."

For a moment Merrill didn't understand, and then she laughed wildly, the pain melting away in the way it did whenever Hawke was silly just for her. "The Champion of Kirkwall going into battle naked!" She gushed in mirth, and it made Hawke's smile grow wider. "Why can't I ever have that dream?"

And then they fell silent once more, smiles melting away as neither one had any words of comfort with the impending battle looming over their heads. They were both Mages against Templars, and both of them knew very well that the odds were that one, or both, of them wouldn't survive to see the sunset. Hawke was an experienced swordswoman, and the Templars couldn't dispel Merrill's Blood Magic, but they didn't like their chances.

"I love you." Hawke whispered, and the words nearly broke Merrill's heart. She hadn't heard Hawke's voice tremble once since she had comforted Merrill after Marethari's death, and the death of her own mother before that.

"I love you too, Ma Vhenan." Merrill held her arms out, and Hawke accepted, wrapping her arms around the Dalish girl and resting their foreheads together like two swans kissing. "With all my heart, all the passion in my soul." She felt her heart palpitate, thundering in her chest as if to confirm her words, to give physical confirmation to feelings. It beat for Hawke, and Hawke alone.

More silence as they dreaded what was to come. There was electricity in the air, and every nerve in their bodies was tingling in anticipation of whenever the Templars came.

"My love," Merrill whispered with anxiety on her breath, realizing just how terrifying the thoughts of the oncoming battle were. She couldn't live without Hawke, she simply couldn't. Granted, Hawke was the most powerful woman in the entirety of Thedas, but even so, there would be hundreds of Templars and only a handful of them. If Hawke died...

Hawke shook her head desperately, putting g a finger over Merrill's lips to silence the little elven girl. "Don't." She pleaded, a torn sob in her voice and tears at the edges of her eyes. "Merrill, please don't say goodbye. This can't be the end, i-it can't."

There were tears at the edges of Merrill's eyes too, and she held Hawke closely, squeezing her so tight that she thought they might simply merge into one being at any moment. "No." Merrill sobbed at the realization that Hawke was right, holding her tears back as much as she could. "It can't." She couldn't live without Hawke, and Hawke couldn't live without her.

Hawke buried her head into Merrill's shoulder, and she could feel her wife's tears trickling down her shoulder. Merrill likewise put her head onto Hawke's hair, and let herself cry too, just a little. Both of them knew that they should be strong for the other, but they also knew that there was no weakness of shame to be found in vulnerability to one another.

She pulled back a minute later, her eyes glistening and red, and she gave a weak, tired smile that was much too small for someone like Hawke. Merrill took her hand, and squeezed it comfortingly.

"Merrill, listen." She murmured in a broken but somewhat hopeful voice. "You're the best thing that's ever happened to me in my entire life. I don't know if there's a Maker or Creators or whatever that blessed me with you, or if we're just some cosmic coincidence, or... I don't know, but there's nothing I could ever do to deserve you in my entire, even if I live a thousand years. I-I love you so much, and I-"

Merrill cut her off with a sweet, loving kiss. She could feel Hawke tense a little in surprise, and then wrapped her arms around her completely in a warm embrace, holding her wife as closely as she could, and it lasted for what felt like forever.

"Ma Vhenan." She whispered when it ended. "This isn't the end."

Hawke smiled with sadness and hope, and opened her mouth to speak, but then a shout came from the Mages on watch for the Templars. Hawke turned and slipped out of Merrill's arms to face his shouts.

"Maker's Breath!" He screamed, turning and waving his staff wildly. "They're here! Th-there must be a thousand of them!"

Hawke turned to meet Merrill's eyes, who smiled and gave Hawke's hand another comforting squeeze. Whatever came, the wouldn't die today. They couldn't. If there was any justice in the world, then the Creators wouldn't let them be killed for protecting innocent people in the war that they shouldn't have been a part of in the first place.

This wasn't the end.


End file.
